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I have an annoying duct,
Just had a WSI in for a level 2 survey and it still specifies old fashioned SLR cameras and BW and Colour film including hard slides for archive. Is this common to all county specifications or is it just mine. I have had this a number of times now for all sorts of field work.
Despite the B&W film being rarer than chicken lips, surely a digital camera can cover all todays photography and archiving could be on DVD or CD or reproduced on photographic paper for the furture.
Yours modern and confused in Glasgow.:face-approve:
Close enough for a country job!
What do you mean lost on price again!
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I sympathise.
Vertually all aspects of commercial projects are now digital; why hold on to antiquated photographic formats?
We are in the age of e-planning: whats the point of being able to access (in theory) all documents relating to a planning application but not the archaeological componant?
Primary archive data is frequently produced in digital formats only: eg site plans, Context data is increasingly digitally captured on site without a paper archive being produced; internet based publication is on the increase. No unit so far as I am aware uses archive grade materials for all aspects of site archives, correspondence or research archive or indeed paper copies of reports.
If you have doubts over long-term archive issues of digital data, lets go back to the 1970s, otherwise whats the point of having B & W photographs in 200years if all other information is lost?
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I deal with this issue all the time at the moment.
Unfortunately, I don't have the time to explain all the problems, but the main ones are that (even high quality) CD's and DVD's aren't proven to be archivally stable (if you find any that are guaranteed to be readable after 20 years I'd be surprised - and if so, please let me know).
Even photos taken from negatives aren't very archivally stable - which is why you should always archive negatives or slides as well, so that new paper copies can be made. Photos printed on your average office printer (even using high quality paper and ink), are unlikely to survive in the long term.
Digital formats regularly change. I have work I did five years ago that I can no longer open using a normal computer.
The only way (at the moment) to really archive digital data is to have it 'actively' managed. This involves having the data stored on servers, regularly backed up, regularly checked for corruption, file formats updated etc etc. Most archives are not set up to accept digital data yet, plus, as it takes active management (not just store in appropriate temp, humidity etc conditions), it has an ongoing cost. Obviously any curator would expect reassurance that this cost is going to be covered for the foreseeable future.
Apparently it is possible to 'burn' digital data onto slides/negatives, however, this is extremely expensive.
The ADS does have some information about digital archives on-line, I believe.
I actually think that it's sad how a lot of family snaps etc are unlikely to be around for our descendents. I love looking at old snaps, but I suspect in 100 years time all we will have are some degraded cds/dvds, containing digital files which your average person isn't going to be able to read on their computer or whatever snazzy piece of kit we have then. At least printed out photos anyone can just pick up and take a look at.
Just my two-pence worth!
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Cross posted with Simon - Don't even start me on the issue of archiving the rest of the site file - aaaaggghhhh!
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To summarise... Colour slide really is on its way out and should be replaced by digital. B+W negatives however are still the best quality medium and the most archivally stable, I'm also not aware of any problems sourcing either the film or processing - try Jessops. Archiving isn't the only problem/shortcoming of digital photography see this for a detailed discussion:
http://www.archaeologists.net/modules/ic...gifilm.pdf
Not really a 'pot person'.
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Take a look here
http://www.dlib.org/dlib/july98/07lyman.html
Its old i know... but relevant.
Also a good way would be to renew your digital archive every 10years.
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bet I know where this is!
"No job worth doing was ever done on time or under budget.."
Khufu
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But only certain types of black-and-white film are archivally stable. You need to ensure that a silver-based black-and-white film is employed. I cannot remember the names of the product at the moment but the negatives look silver, whilst other types of black and white film have a coloured taint.
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PLease also look at this document... a modern take... ??
yeah yeah... I know..... nothing like plugging a standard that I may have a small part in
http://www.eastlothian.gov.uk/documents/...-12775.PDF
"No job worth doing was ever done on time or under budget.."
Khufu
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I agree with Anna regarding the stability of cd/dvd mediums, but this may be overtaken by solid storage usb drives etc which are becoming increasingly cheap, but this doesn't really address the route problem of the rate at which the core technology may change. Although JPEG readers can be written relatively easily from scratch, at least according to wiser minds than mine [:I]
Also, wasn't so long ago that I was required to use a wide format SLR....anybody seen that rocking horse... [:0]...dung?
I maiali sono alimentati e aspettano per volare
